NewBoy: Inside in pots while the weather is cool, outside from the time the sun really starts to heat up and protect at night if the forecast is cool or rainy (gardening fleece, old net curtains, etc.). :Leaving them in pots means you can follow the sun around if necessary and frees up veg patch space for other luscious goodies.

Newboy2: now I'm jealous. I pricked out my toms today and they are only about an inch high and in small root trainers. 9" pots in late March seems well advanced but remember toms do not like to get cold. I'm in Mangotsfield, North East Bristol and it's too cold to contemplate putting tender plants out just yet and yes, it's raining here too!!!

Rain isn't a problem, NewBoy, temps are the consideration for planting outside either in the ground or in pots. You'd need at least high teens C daytime and not less than mid-teens overnight to be worthwhile.

I'll be sowing the seed of mine this week-end, I know this will give me a nice sized plants for my cold greenhouse during the second week in May, when hopefully we shouldn't have anymore frost.....the seed of outdoor varieties will be sown two week's later.

Although my tomato harvest last year was v good, I'm holding off a bit longer before starting seeds indoors (probably till mid/late Apr). I started them about this time last year but the cold end to Spring meant I kept them inside longer than they'd have liked and they were somewhat light-starved - I've only got a small coldframe, no proper greenhouse/conservatory. Having said that, they recovered v well but thought I'd give this later approach a go...

I'll be sowing my outdoor toms mid to late April, they'll live on the kitchen and dining room windowsills until they're too big to fit there, then hopefully it'll be ok for them to go out into the two mini-greenhouses until they burst out of them, when they'll just have to go into big pots on the south-facing terrace.

Haven't sown any toms yet - probably next week. Same as Dove - windowsills till they go out into a plastic growhouse where they will stay. We get very few nights through the summer that have a high enough temperature even if it's warm enough through the day. Had a great crop last year - I expect the lovely summer helped!